:BUILD THREAD: Blouch 1.5xt-r in my 08 outback XT

Getting parts in as we speak for my next big project on my 08 Outback XT. Burnt an exhaust valve so we pulled apart the motor. People convinced me to

"refresh" the short block since it was out. This refresh became a built short block. Threw my wallet at it and parts are trickling in.

Post #2 will have the build plans.

first the back story. We were driving to Utah to go mountain biking, we pulled off in Vegas to ride some of the local trails there and the car had a wicked stumble at idle. WE said Ff it and rode in Vegas and then continued to Utah. Car was fantastic on the freeway and had all the power I wanted, no overheating or oil loss. every time we checked.

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When we got to the campsite in Utah we got busy. We bought a compression tester at Harbor Freight, and new spark plugs and a tool kit from Autozone. We tore into it and did a compression test. Dead #4. I have a bike pump that has a big air chamber in it so we did a makeshift leak down test. After finding top dead center on #4. we put a plastic bag of the oil filler spot, and over the tail pipe. Let the air chamber go and we popped one of the bags off the exhaust pipe. All signs pointed toasted valve.

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so we drove it home to San Diego....

We pulled the engine out and found a burnt valve on #4. Pretty cool that our shade tree ideas actually produced a real result. Thankfully these engines come out of the car pretty easy. But in the removal, I found more bad news in the form of a messed up turbo impeller.

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BUILD PLANS

new things to get

Blouch 1.5xt-r biggest turbo that has "good" spool in stock location.

Tial MV-R mount via a Ultimate Racing up/down pipe recirc kit.

Delicious tuning e85 Flex Fuel kit

Closed Deck long block with JE pistons and forged rods from S&S Subarus and Sand Cars

Grimmspeed TMIC so I can use the STI style turbo

GSC Valves/Spirngs/retainers. Why not, the head is getting redone anyway right?

DW1200 ev14 inejctors

ACT 6puck clutch

Crawford AOS

Parts the car already has.

AEM 320 pump

Tomei ELH manifold

COBB intake and airbox

Reasoning on things

Before pulling the turbo, I was just going to get the heads redone and put the car back together with the same shortblock. But on finding the damaged impeller, I was undecided on what to do. I could get it rebuilt for $3-500? or buy a new turbo for around $1k or more. I ended up opting to go big. But then, which turbo? An AVO440xt or similar is as big as you can really get using the stock style TMIC. And it's expensive for basically a gt28 turbo which doesn't get great reviews on Subarus. I started seeing the Blouch turbos that are only a tad more than the 440xt and decided I needed to find an intercooler that will allow an STI style turbo on the Legacy GT/Outback style platform. Thankfully Grimmspeed makes such an intercooler. Once I found the intercooler the choice of turbo was easy. So I ordered a Blouch 1.5 xt-r! Once I decided on the turbo, things started to get out of control... I decided I wanted to do EWG. Ultimate Racing makes a pretty cool kit that fits an sti style turbo and runs the EWG recirculating to the downpipe. Stay tuned for more!

After using a center-force 6 puck clutch in my turbo MR2 I decided to put something similar in the Outback to handle the much increased power output. It could be clutch pedal geometry, but the center-force feels much much lighter than the Exedy Stage 1 HD clutch that I had previous in the outback. I am keeping the stock single mass flywheel primarily for drive-ability. I may loose some fast revs, but I actually drive these cars daily.

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After choosing the Blouch 1.5 XT-r I wanted to maximize it's ability to breath and function within the limits of my mods. I wanted a External Wastegate but I did not wanted it vented externally. I did some searching and a company in canada, Ultimate Racing, makes an up-pipe downpipe EWG set up. They supply a Tial MV-r EWG with the version of the kit I bought. I had them make it a three bolt up-pipe to match my current Tomei ELH. Once I got the exhaust bits from Ultimate Racing I had them Cerakoted at a local powder coating place. East County Powdercoating

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before Cerakote

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Remember to replace some of the old age items like hoses and clean the engine grounds and mating surface of the block and tranny.

Good Luck with your project.

Remember to replace some of the old age items like hoses and clean the engine grounds and mating surface of the block and tranny.

 

Good Luck with your project.

Yeah. One of my posts was going to be all the hoses and stuff. Everything that runs water or oil through it is new. Every hose and o-ring..

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Looks like a small piece of that valve went into the compressor. Too bad. A catted UP like we have in the 2005 models would have saved the turbo

Nice workshop there. Awesome interpretation of the old fashioned repair 'bay'.

I doubt the valve piece knocked the turbo. When I pulled my heads with a burnt valve the piece of valve fell out from between the head and piston. Good luck on the build. I love my Dom1.5XT-R.

Yeah, i am pretty sure it was some foreign object that damaged the turbo. If a valve piece would have, it would have taken out the hot side, not the cold inlet side

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I love that you did all this troubleshooting at the campsite. Epic!! This reminds me when we went camping to Gooseberry mesa in Utah to go MTB and had to figure out a way to cover my torn cv joint. I had fun too!

I would note that this burnt valve would have probably be avoided if the valve clearance would have been checked. You must have had slight rough idle for a while no?

Yeah, i am pretty sure it was some foreign object that damaged the turbo. If a valve piece would have, it would have taken out the hot side, not the cold inlet side

 

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Good point. My brain must have been on holiday yesterday!

I love that you did all this troubleshooting at the campsite. Epic!! This reminds me when we went camping to Gooseberry mesa in Utah to go MTB and had to figure out a way to cover my torn cv joint. I had fun too!

 

I would note that this burnt valve would have probably be avoided if the valve clearance would have been checked. You must have had slight rough idle for a while no?

No rough idle that I can remember, nothing noticeable. Car had 137k miles. There were signs of leaked coolant, so I am sure i got hot here or there. Although it has never over heated.

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While tearing apart the engine after deciding to go for the full rebuild, I found signs that thebcar had been leaking coolant from the crossover pipes. Also, some tiny scarring on the top side of cylinder #4. Only can see the marks, cannot feel or measure them with a bore gauge. Also, checkout the nasty looking water pump. This was a legit OE subaru pump after only about 45k miles. I guess it didn't like running on water plus 'water wetter' for 5k miles after the tear down 45k ago. switched to distilled water and Subaru coolant after the first 5k. Not sure why I didn't fill up with Subaru coolant in the first place. probably just forgot to buy it when I did the last project.

We checked the bore with a guage and everything measured in spec even at 137k miles. Decided to go built block because the heads are getting work anyway, and also the decision to go bigger turbo.

Piston #4 showed no signs of ringland failure, or any kind of damage.

Also, not pictured, but one of the screws on the back of the stock oil pump was slightly loose.

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@Rhitter. We'll see...I still have a stock TMIC, maybe if i don't find a guy, i'll see if I can find a cheap vf46

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But VF52 doesn't have the power of a DOM1.5. Looking forward to watching the build.

You're preaching to the choir my friend

<-- guy with a Dom1.5 on personal car / test mule

Subbed...

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Did you rule out the stock location efr7163? Great spool and power..

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